Distinctly anthropocene winds’ve blown steady from greed-rotted overlord maw for the entire lifetimes of the most propagandized generations in history as the sickness of militant capitalist technofascist social engineering ensures mutual destruction amongst mass-hypnotized flocks. Pressured by rising environmental death, isolated by mounting sickness and spilling over the edge with radioactive hatred for the opportunist’s murderous doom hailing down all around Finnish death metal quintet UNEARTHLY RITES emerge from their frost-barricaded bunker for a second full-length album in protest. Though they’d impressed with a noxious vibe and sludge-hazed gloom on their debut the band’s second revolution, ‘Tortural Symphony of the Flesh‘, goes further over the top with weirder, darker and more insane levels of expression which both corrupts and reinforces the earliest appeal of late 80’s Scandinavian death metal exploration unhindered by commercialism. Along this path of deranged activism the band further explore the unhinged nature of gore-grind level nox, weirding crust/hardcore punk burst and harsh noisome atmospheric dredge.

Unearthly Rites formed back in 2020 as guitarist Santtu (Praise, Frogskin) called together a group of pandemic enslaved fellowes from local (north of Helsinki) scenery for something darker, heavier than their collective parts. The original trio of thrashers and sludgers produced a self-titled EP (‘Unearthly Rites‘, 2021) soon after approximating what might potentially bind fifth-gen ‘old school’ death metal revision, sludge metal tones, and erratic grindcore imposed interruptus. You’ll find the general seed of their sound and some of their core construction on display there but it was their Prosthetic-released debut LP (‘Ecdysis‘, 2024) that’d made a statement per its dystopic vision of the present where unrepentant doom and ecological collapse fed sublimely atmospheric, rotted-through take on ‘new old school’ death metal.

That first album’s style reflected something like late 80’s/early 90’s Scandinavian death metal’s adjacency to the grindcore of the same era, pre-empted by sound design thickly layered with the buzz of distorted bass and speaker-dragging guitar tones… almost like Nirvana 2002 in spiritus but also not so far removed from the messier sludge-death of bands like Ilsa or even Coffins. That debut won me over in terms of its protest-heavy idealism and the chaotic ugliness of Unearthly Rites‘ sound but hadn’t convinced any level of death metal authenticity would stick around as they’d evolved. This was incorrect in some respects as ‘Tortural Symphony of the Flesh‘ adheres to the basement-level demo inflicted read they’d forged prior, embracing the guttural proto-deathgrind distention that’d lent their work an untamed punkish quality.

Promising a darker, horror-inducing anticapitalistic rejection of fossil-industrial society with “Queer BDSM lust and the words of William Blake” as curative of “christofascist trajectory” speaks to the myriad far left world view and rabid lyrical intent of Unearthly Rites‘ efforts. It is a lot of spin to sum on paper but I’d parse their ‘tude and vision as a crust-brained crew making spastic ‘old school’ afflicted death metal and getting better at it with each release. Album opener “Tuonen tulijat, manan menijät” speaks to two key strengths of the band which’ve become inflamed over time, the first being the scrambling auld whammy wrenching leads of co-vocalist/guitarist Simo (Dome Runner, Igniter) and the brutish command of vocalist Sisli who acts as an increasingly toxic element in the band’s overall gig via exaggerative expression. Whether you’re into Autopsy or, I dunno, Knoll there’ll be enough achieved in those first ~three and a half minutes to mostly know where you stand with the band.

Things don’t truly begin to worm into mind ’til the second (“Sokli Fields Forever / A Radiative Picnic”) and third (“Solstice”) pieces hit and we begin to hear the nodes of grindcore, sludge, crust and doom informing the rhythmic hand of the band. These pieces reveal the choppy, interruptive and rusty clandestine spirit and methodology of the band but the latter is where is all comes into better focus. With “Solstice” Unearthly Rites lumber in with descending propulsion, hit us with a Finndeath style abyssal weaving riff but continue to interrupt it with an odd-timed, scrambling bassline which echoes said riff in spastic push. This is one of my favorite pieces on the album because as it continues to find variations on this movement for much of its duration, retaining a sense of meandering gloom without over (or under) complicating the larger thread pursued. This is more-or-less the extent of the positive first impression given by the album in preview and what’d prompted a closer ear.

That closer listen was slightly marred by the less interesting padding/interludium offered via “A Stygian Winterscape” and “Not For the Weak” later on but these pieces offer scalding relief as we pass into the peaking high of interest on ‘Tortural Symphony of the Flesh‘, its gnarled mid-point. The title track (“Tortural Symphony of the Flesh”) is the peak of Unearthly Rites‘ scuffed madness here from my point of view, the song itself is kind of a musical non-statement beyond some grinding escalation of the main riff but the gorging of the vocals and swinging leads posted throughout bring an unhinged spot to the full listen, a moment which ensures the full listen never feels wholly programmed, dialed-up, freaked out rather than preened over. That feeling also factors into another favorite track of mine, “Ignis Fatuus”, the longest piece on offer and the one to push the limits of their crazed animal noises-fed bizarro grind gesturing while also digging up some of their death/doom sludging in slightly different context. Closer “The Notion of Emerging Totalitarianism” is similar in its methods but reeks of even more radiation burnt finality.

Beyond that second wind in the second third of the full listen Unearthly Rites‘ hand lands inconsistent but this reads somewhat by design as their odd-walking flow ultimately makes sense on the brush through its ~40 minute run. There are some finer details worth mentioning here and there, such as the memorable Slimeweaver artwork and difficult-to-decipher lyrics otherwise but I believe most death metal fans will rip through an album like this pretty fast and be most stoked by vocal oddities, a few choice riffs and the quick-turns offered by their vestigial interest in grind/hardcore punk. Though I’d been left wanting more unique rhythmic interest and focused wield of their vocal expression overall I’d appreciated that these folks aren’t aiming anywhere near the increasingly bland status quo of ‘new old school’ death metal revisionism. A moderately high recommendation.

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